[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
I've only read the short-handed section so far, but it is quite good.

[/ QUOTE ]
I've read much more now (bluffing, semi-bluffing, deception) and the book is very strong. The advice seems a bit less structured than in some other books, but it is full of ideas that are correct and useful.

Despite its subtitle (". . . for players of all levels"), I think there's a fair amount in the book that beginners won't grasp very well on their first reading. Also, some of the topics that are covered (e.g., deception) just don't matter at the lowest limits.

This is definitely a more advanced book than, say, WLLHE (Jones). It's probably more at the SSHE level except that, compared to SSHE, it suffers from a lack of hand examples.

Overall, it's a good book. The advice is strong, obviously written by a winning player.

[/ QUOTE ]

maurile, good report and i concur with most of it.

i like the writing style. very easy to read.

not a basic book by any stretch. you are correct that it doesn't have very many hand examples.

matt seems to think you need the "check-raise" and even says if no one check-raises, you can basically win by playing very little up-front and lots of with good position. i wish he fleshed that out ala sklansky, miller, harrington, yao king etc. it would have been interesting, because i almost never see check-raises at low limit passive games (probably not what matt plays regularly)

very good section on shorthanded games.

i think at least 7 or 8 of the short chapters are very good, and it has some of the best stuff i've seen on certain topics. so definitely a worthwhile book.

my sense is that matt plays very high limit games (and i've read that)